Tag Archives: Germany

Leaving Finland

September 7, 2014 CrazyChineseFamily 27 Comments

It is finally the time to leave Finland. Tomorrow morning we have to get up around 5am, get into our full packed cars and drive 360km south to Helsinki where the ferry is waiting to take us to Germany. Up till now we have done packing, packing and some more packing in the hope to get as much of our stuff as possible to Germany. It actually mostly worked out however my precious books have stay behind until my parents can take them next year with them in late summer. Looking at our cars it appears that we have done some tuning work to lower them as far as possible. No, it won’t be an enjoyable journey, the cars are so full that our seats had to be put more to the front, my wife will have her seat full of stuff and to make it even less comfortable she will have to carry both bunnies on her lap. Nathan’s seat looks like a cave, surrounded by boxes filled with our belongings (no need to worry, everything is fixed to their spot so nothing can move in case of an emergency full brake).

We have done all kind of different strange work since we arrived. Preparing some fire wood for next spring, fixing my grandparents tombstone and checking which poor trees will be cut down next year by my father. My dad is really good in cutting down trees but he really doesn’t like finishing the wood working as my mother in complaining for over twenty years that the firewood is always too big for the different wood fired ovens. We also got our boat out of the water and carried it to our little boat shed. As the boat is made out of real wood we had to do some extra work with it such as drying it first for a week and then applying some flaxseed oil to preserve the wood. The boat has been handcrafted few years ago by our neighbour who passed away sometime later, making it the last handcrafted boat in the area, perhaps even in whole of west Finland.

The past days have been restless. Awaiting our departure in the cottage while watching nature preparing for autumn. It has been getting colder here, only rarely the sun peeks through the mist which is hanging heavily upon the lake during most of the day. Somehow it feels like it is time to leave, start anew somewhere far away from the cottage, from Finland our old home. I am watching my father walking around our beach, in his own way saying goodbye to his little paradise. He and my mother will be back next summer whereas I will be most likely not be able to see Finland and the cottage for a couple of years, depending on my work.

I say farewell Finland, you have been my home for the past seven years. Life has been not always easy here but I met my wife here, Nathan was born here so not everything was all that bad. With our moving away I also take away one possible future burden away from you, Mother-in-law will be terrorizing Germany next time, not you Finland.

Crazy Family, Uncategorized

Moving Away

August 24, 2014 CrazyChineseFamily 15 Comments

Moving to a new home is always both hard work and fun. Hard work as you have to get all your belongings sorted, pack everything up, rethink if this particular item you bought few years ago has a spot in your new home or should better end up in the trash bin (probably it should already years before) and sell furniture you don’t need anymore. Fun because it is basically a fresh start for you, you are able to set up in the new home everything how you like it (as it was nearly impossible in your old home because of the mass of furniture and other stuff). Now think how much work it is just to move to another building, street, city or province and then think about how damn hard it is to move with all your stuff to another country.

Yes, it is nearly time for us to move finally to Germany. Wednesday my parents will arrive with their car and a trailer. However we won’t go directly to Germany but first to the cottage again as my parents decided to take our sofa and washing machine. This trip to the cottage is actually a nice idea as it will give us the opportunity to relax for a few days before starting the next part of our journey. Okay, we anyways have to get out of the apartment before we can go to Germany as our renters will move in right after we leave.

WP_20140824_004 — The rice cooker is still needed

Now there are a few things which come in very handy when moving and they show that I am just really unable to plan such events. First of all my I want to share my original plan. My grand idea was to rent a truck, pack it full with our stuff and I would drive it , have my father with our car and my mother would be with their own car. This might sound pretty good until you see how much it actually cost to rent a truck in Finland and use it only one-way to Germany. Latest the truck costs for a ferry spot would blow your budget! A ferry? Yes a ferry as we do not wish to drive thousands of kilometres, especially with a little baby in the car and our bed on the car roof.

WP_20140824_006 — and more moving boxes…

Now I come to the part where it is just great to have parents or people who think a bit different and looking always for how to keep any costs low, to have a wife who is really fond of internet auctioning websites and last but not least be able to admit that the own plan is a horrible one. You see, my parents have friends who visit Finland every summer and few agreed to take several boxes filled with our earthly possessions with them to Germany by car. I am not talking about one or two boxes which might find a little corner in their trunk but about over 20 huge moving cardboard boxes! Then also the fact that there is my old man buying all those moving boxes for us and bringing them to Finland in the first place. My own idea was to put all our stuff into, well, I have absolutely no clue at all, probably scattered around in the truck.

Now why it is so good to have a wife who loves internet auctioning websites? We had to either sell much of our furniture or simply throw it away. Thanks to my wife we were actually able to sell most of the stuff and earned few extra bucks which can be used later to buy great new things for our new apartment. Yay, to my pathetic plan…

Now to the sad part of us moving away and not to have enough space in the car: Our beloved George as to stay in our old apartment and will find a new home with the people renting our apartment. George, I am sorry and we will miss you! But don’t worry, we will do our best to take you to Germany as well some when in the future. I hope you are not too hurt by the fact that I don’t remember whether you are a Dracaena or a Yucca…

WP_20140824_007 — George, we will miss you

Crazy Euopean People, Crazy Family, Mom in Law

Our new Home

June 1, 2014 CrazyChineseFamily 15 Comments

The renovation of our new home started in April during our trip to Germany. Perhaps new home is only a half-truth as it is on one hand our new place to be but on the other hand it is also a totally rundown apartment from 1972.

The previous owner lived there since 1976, tried to keep all useless junk in the apartment and to make matters even worse, he smoked there the entire time inside and in the end even up to 3 cigarette cartons a week! I believe now you may start to create a picture on just how messed up everything was there when we started. Sadly I don’t have pictures from before we started throwing stuff out but the several in the gallery might give you some idea how we struggled. These pictures were taken after most stuff had been thrown out and only some basic furniture was left.

I can’t give you any blueprint of the layout (sure I could draw one myself now but I am a bit too lazy for that) so I mention only the basics, 90m²/~968ft² with bedroom, children room, kitchen, bathroom, dining room, living room and most importantly for our little bunnies: a balcony.

In April we managed only to remove all the old stuff including furniture, wallpapers, carpet flooring and tiles in bathroom and kitchen. Especially the wallpapers proofed to be very hard work as nearly every room was decorated with Ingrain wallpaper, a nightmare glued to the wall…

Mother-in-law and my wife also helped a lot during the renovation process by cleaning the old radiators (there are several old cast iron ones!) and repainting them several times until they reached once again a nice white surface color. As the ceiling was very yellow due to all the smoking for so long time we had to prepare it before painting. This preparation meant we had to “scrub” the ceiling several times with a brush and washing soda until we could paint on few layers of special anti-nicotine color. At least my wife had some fun already by choosing the new wallpaper for each room with special focus for the baby room. Sadly we had not time to start put new wallpapers on the room for little Nathan as some guy still needed to fix a huge crack in the wall! (40 years ago the roof was leaking water in and that part of the wall settled a bit resulting in a crack in the wall…)

Bathroom after I ripped everything out and had fun with the tiles for several days

Now during our time back in Finland some professionals are installing new windows and water pipes as those two things are the original setup from 1972 and not working anymore as intended. In September we will then finally move to Germany but we will have to stay with my parents for at least a month as the apartment is far from ready. Tile and wood flooring are still missing and not to forget that there is no bathroom or kitchen yet. After all that we will have some busy time buying new furniture as we are selling most of our old stuff here in Finland to make the whole moving process a bit easier to handle.